


Enough

by Ritzy_bird



Series: JeanMarco Month 2017 [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Gen, Happy Ending, M/M, ambiguous setting, no really I have no idea what time period this is set in, use your imagination we're FreshOut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-07
Updated: 2017-06-07
Packaged: 2018-11-10 04:47:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11120217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ritzy_bird/pseuds/Ritzy_bird
Summary: What do you say to someone you haven't known in 4 years?[JeanMarco Month 2017 - Prompt: Reunion/Fate]





	Enough

**Author's Note:**

> You know how some people stress about using "/" or "and" when it comes to pairings in tags? I always forget the difference, and I'm sure a lot of other people do too. So is it not the best way to reach all the JM shippers to go with both and say a prayer that it doesn't make well-informed fanfic veterans cringe?
> 
> Special thanks to tiggeryumyum for reading this through and helping me make it less ambiguous then it was going to be.

People never change, but circumstances _do_. That's what Jean always believed, and what he tries to tell himself in the weeks following the day he moves away. Everyone who he wouldn't see every day anymore, talk to, spend time with. They'd still be the same next time.

Staying in contact with so much in his life- _Everyone's_ lives going on, was equally as much harder than he thought. Little by little, his old friends, even some of his family, had lost touch with him. 

Could he really blame them, or was it his fault? Maybe it was hard for them to find things to talk to him about that didn't revolve around the deaths in the family, or maybe Jean was too scarce on information in his responses for them to care.

His passing grandparents and uncle, the thousands mile trip his family had taken because of it, readjusting to a new home, none of that had exhausted and depressed him more than simply being unable to connect with the old people in his life. 

Letters, their only form of communication, could only express so much. In less than a year's time, Jean had stopped trying. This was supposed to be a fresh look on life after all, right? He'd let his parents and his siblings keep in touch however they pleased, but Jean had had enough writing on sheets of paper about things like the weather or how the food was here. 

He could take a temporary visit back, and keep in touch that way, but Jean didn't see the point. You can't move on if you just keep trying to live in the past, right? At least here his life would go by smoother, with less work to do.  
Marco, Jean's closest friend, didn't give up so easily. Writing, writing, and writing some more, through out that whole year. Even when Jean didn't send a letter back, Marco didn't wait long before sending another. 

Really, it was sweet. But all the same, too much for Jean to handle. Too many words he'd have to come up with and somehow send back, as if they're worthy enough responses. 

Out of all the things he thought he'd miss... he thought he'd miss.... Honestly, Jean didn't think he'd miss a thing. All he wanted to do was get out of there. Leave that place behind and move on. There was too much there that he didn't care for anymore. 

The point was, he didn't think he'd miss talking with _people_ so much. People here? They weren't the same. Something about even the kindest of them seemed artificial, and forced. Common to the point that it never seemed sincere, so it wasn't special, and Jean couldn't reconnect. He couldn't have his fresh start. 

Marco may not have given up without a fight, but, he too had to give it a rest and move on with his life at some point. 

_'How are you?'_

It was the start of the most recent letter that he'd received from Marco, and Jean felt his chest practically collapse at the words. This was how it started, the nothingness of bland, forced conversation as two people who didn't know each other at all anymore tried desperately to keep contact in between living their lives. 

There was really no need to read the rest of the letter, but Jean had anyway. A year and some months, and already he felt like he was losing his dearest friend. Not that he was mad. They weren't children; As much as Jean had acted like one, they didn't have all the time in a day to write elaborate letters to each other.

_'I'm fine.'_

A poor excuse of a response, unfitting of the kind of long-term friendship they'd had. What Jean would do, who he'd kill, to sit back in a chair next to his old friends and tell them about the shit day he had. To drag them down places they didn't even think he'd be in, though, would be unfair. It was time to grow up.

Writing was so impersonal, it felt so unreal. It wasn't at all like being there, right there next to someone, to hold their hand, to watch their face, listen to them cry. There were the things his immediate family couldn't help like others could, and he had no one new to help him. 

Time would pass with or without his old friends and family there to support him, and as he realized that Marco had given up in the same vein others had, he'd lost interest in his dreams of success. Every day just became the hope to accomplish one thing: Do better tomorrow.

Jean let go of his older friends, his distant family. On occasion he would think about them wistfully, remembering the better times and wishing he could relive them. More often than not though, he relished in the thoughts of Marco. Lord did Jean wish he'd talked more with him before he left.

You could live without some distant family, certainly. But what's someone to do without their best friend? 

Rain or shine, hurricane or blizzard, Jean couldn't stop hating the new world around him. All because it wasn't home, his real home. It didn't help to hear from someone else, that back home the weather was something else, literally anything else that wasn't here. Jean was envious just for that. 

While Jean was busy living every day trying to learn where he wanted his life to go, he realized through his family, tid-bits of information from their own letters, that the people they'd left behind were moving forward. Learning, living, earning, improving. 

He'd heard through one of the rare letters Marco would sometimes send, that he was making thrilling progress in the community, building it out, making it better, improving lives like he'd always told Jean he would.

It made Jean spiteful to a point, but it made him realize something nobody else seemed to for years. He was never ready for a fresh start. 

Whether it was for himself, or to push the accomplishments of others down, Jean began to study tirelessly. The whole world would leave him behind, if he kept letting it. People were starting families, building businesses, changing society for the better, and Jean? 

Jean was lost in time and nostalgia, wishing for things that would never just come to him. He could never go back there, to what used to be home, to who _he_ used to be when he was there. It made his bones ache and his muscles twist in a pain that he knew was all in his head, to face the reality that like his now-gone family members, his old life wasn't coming back.

And maybe, he didn't really want to go back. Maybe he only remembered what he wanted to, the relaxing nights out with his family, the thrilling days spent with his friends causing more trouble than they were worth even at their age, the simple work he could do but always chose not to. 

It was never perfect, and Jean never viewed it like it was. After all, he desperately wanted to leave the more disenchanted his home seemed, as his childish, arrogant, and sometimes even selfish ways got the best of him. But this place, this simple little life, it wasn't _his_.

There were the nights of pure genius and understanding, real breakthroughs to Jean that gave him hope for the future he'd always fantasized about and expected to fall into his lap. There were also nights of nothing, a whole storm of nothingness and nearly endless doubt. The world had no problem leaving him behind before, how in this world or the next could he possibly catch up? 

Was he even a man, or just a boy stuck in time and too childish to accept the monotonous nowhere life he'd agreed to living? All this knowledge, and what did he plan to do with it...? 

Desperately, Jean wished he could just snap his fingers and contact the people of his past again. Anyone, including him, knew better though. It wasn't as easy as just writing up a letter and sending it to someone, as if you both know exactly what's going on in each other's lives. 

Jean closed those doors of communication forever ago, and sometimes it almost tore him up inside and killed him knowing that he couldn't just tell Marco how much he missed him. Marco's optimism, and sometimes false clarity about situations that were seemingly beyond control. His smile, his poorly tamed hair, his laugh...? 

In all honesty, he'd forgotten what Marco really sounded like, maybe even what he looked like. One thing he could never forget of course, was his love. Jean missed that and everything else they'd had, but he couldn't linger on it. If he did that, then he was back at the "How are you"s.

Studying to gain knowledge, to better himself, to get more impressive work than the day-to-day shuffling between people, was hard. Jean kept at it though, through every month of relapse into old and useless habits, for every week of calm and genuine happiness. 

This place wasn't home, and maybe he didn't know where "home" really was, but... he knew where to start. It wasn't like he could hope the world would present him with a gift, no, he had to go out there and find it. Run to it. 

Without warning, but with much fear, Jean decided he had to go back before he could move all the way forward. Thousands of miles and an uncertain amount of days more, like he'd done in the past, and he'd back "home" again. After that, well, he'd have to figure it out. 

Jean never sent Marco any letter telling him he'd be coming back, not until the last possible moment, days before he'd arrive. It terrified him, and he shook as he smoothed his hand across the piece of paper he was meant to write on. If there was any person he had to see first it'd be him, but, how should he start...?

The town, it'd never felt more different. Like a story being described to him in a book, so perfectly in his mind's eye, but not so much that he could paint it out if asked. Like it was real, but he also knew that some of it was just his mind dusting away the grime and making things feel like they have more of a sparkle to them.

His first stop was obvious, of course. His heart yearned for this, for years, no matter how few and far between he'd felt it, or the ferocity each time it hit. Walking onto Marco's front yard, now, that was almost exhilarating. Did the way the ground resisted before him, and the darker, more saturated color of the grass really seem so identical to his memories? Or was he imagining something to comfort himself yet again?

Jean was perfectly stunned as he saw Marco push open the front door almost carefully, gently letting it close behind him. He walked forward, eyes squinting for a moment in the sun before their gazes locked. 

Marco looked so, different. He was taller, of course, but had his skin gotten a little darker? Or no was that, _stubble_ on his face? 

At a loss for words, Jean continued to stand there like a fool. Bags dangled at his side as his weak arms tried to hold them up. What was he supposed to say to someone he knew almost nothing about in the years they'd been apart? And what, would Marco be angry? Upset? Would either of them cry? It'd been so long. It's been _so long_.

It didn't take Marco very long to decide for himself, "Hey," Jean nearly dropped his bags, he was so startled at first. " _Hey_ ," Marco repeated, a warm smile growing on his face. "What're you doing here?" He asked casually, stopping only a few feet away.

_God_ , it was.... He was different, of course, but still Marco. Of course, he was still Marco. "Hi." Jean breathed out, relieved, nothing more than ease washing over him as he let go of his bags and stepped forward. 

Jean fell into a hug as Marco offered one, and the embrace was as casual and comforting as it ever had been. "I, I have _no idea_ what I'm doing here!" Jean quickly laughed as they pulled apart, shaking his head and kicking one of his bags. 

"Alright..." Marco nodded, looking down at the bags briefly before returning his eyes to Jean. "Alright then. It's good to see you again." He bent down and hoisted one of Jean's bags onto his shoulder. 

"Oh, you don't even know." Jean sighed, rolling his eyes as he picked his other things back up, followed by the both of them walking towards the house. 

"Yeah?" Marco asked, his voice curious. But there was no extra pressure to tell more, no question outside of the genuine curiosity. Just like Marco always had been. 

Jean smirked and closed his eyes, inhaling. "Mhmm, but you tell me, is there someone new to see in here? Orrr?" 

Marco only bent his head back with a light laugh that mellowed into a sigh. "You know there's not."

"So you say." Jean hummed back innocently, unaware but eager to know all that he'd chosen to miss in his years away. 

" _Yes_ , alright? Maybe, maybe in the future. But not now." Marco breathed out calmly, pulling the door open and leaning against it so Jean could walk in. 

Jean breathed a sigh of relief at the normalcy of this, even if things had changed. They hadn't. They were together now, and if by some force of nature they did change, Jean planned to be around for it, even if he happened to be thousands of miles away again.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Did you like it? How did you feel about it? Comment, or send me an ask at my tumblr crackerjacknotanon. I love feedback. Feedback is the butter on my french toast.


End file.
